


Merlin Oneshots

by narutoslilwhiskers



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Arthur as Sebastian, Arthur is a Jazz Musician, Crossover, F/F, F/M, Falling In Love, Gen, Gwen as Mia, La La Land, M/M, Romantic Comedy, romantic Arthur
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-09
Updated: 2017-01-09
Packaged: 2018-09-16 01:46:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9268277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/narutoslilwhiskers/pseuds/narutoslilwhiskers
Summary: Collection of Merlin oneshots. Many are inspired by movies oops.I'll add tags as I go, writing any and all genres and couples tbh because Merlin is a very easy platform for shipping lol





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is inspired by La La Land. I went to the theater to see it and fell head over heels for it- it was so aesthetically pleasing, the music was gorgeous and the characters were so well written I kind of couldn't help putting Gwen and Arthur in it.  
> There will be many similarities but trust me, this will be different from the direction the movies plot took. I wish I owned the movie rights- my heart would still be intact if I did lmao
> 
> Summary: Gwen is smitten with a Jazz musician who has an uncanny ability to bump into her everywhere she goes. She may or may not find him absolutely adorable in his suites and vintage sense of what romance means.

The first time they bump into each other, per say, is at exactly eleven fifteen in the afternoon in a bout of horrible traffic. She's on her way to work and he's on his way home, both respectively sat in the their very opposite cars. Gwen is dressed to the T in her barista uniform and Arthur is donning the same suit he'd being wearing the night before with the collar undone and a tie tugged half way down from where it was originally done up. He flips her the bird and she screams at him for being an absolute dimwit.  
She's not late for work and he's exhausted from a night of performing in only the best way you can feel when you spend hours doing something you truly love- but they're both irritated from the constant honking of horns and lack of moving cars.  
He passes her by without so much as a glance and she figures good riddance.

Life continues, they don't see each other until later night. She's just walked what feels like miles from the party her friends had talked her into going to, having had her car towed and no money in her clutch for a taxi. She's wandered into a restaurant, drawn in by the sound of music....and there he is, yet again dressed in a suit. He's banging out a Jazz tune on a Grand Piano in the middle of a high-end restaurant with his heart on his sleeve and his head in the clouds and Gwen feels the air leave her lungs in what feels like a soft sigh. She's done for. The man sat in the figurative spotlight is a different person from the antsy man stuck in traffic; he has Gwen and half the restaurant goers in a state of awe by the time he realizes he's strayed from his designated tracklist of Jingle Bells and Silent Night, breathing heavy and looking sheepish beyond measure as he glances around at the finely dressed people looking right back with wide eyes.  
It feels like ages before she can get her head out of the clouds that this man has managed to create with his fingers and eighty eight ivories, and she is determined to tell him he should be doing better than some restaurant tune boy. She feels like the clouds have gone from above her to below her, walking on them as she looks at him with those big blue eyes and carefully combed blonde hair- he is the epitome of everything she doesn't find attractive in men yet she's struggling to breath without sighing like a love struck teenage girl.  
He's asked- or, rather forced, to leave with his last and final collection of tips from the glass vase on the piano's top with an angry former employer eyeing him as he bumps past Gwen in his angry rush to exit. He looks at her momentarily as she opens her mouth to speak, thinks better of it and continues on his way out of the restaurant.  
She is left standing there with an abundance of equally confused people sharing looks for a few moments before they all settle back into their former conversations. Gwen turns on her heel and leaves through the same door the man had stormed through and finds no trace of him.  
She has no problem admitting to herself that she is disappointed.

She isn't disappointed the next time they cross paths. In fact she's beyond smitten. They catch sight of each other from across the pool area the party had taken place at and she immediately felt a smile tug at her lips at the way he was looking at her. He looked adorably ashamed, perhaps embarrassed was the better word, standing with the rest of the hired cover band dressed very much so like they had all stepped straight out of the 80's. He's no different, dressed in his red and black pleather jacket and high waisted khakis. Gwen feels her chest swell with laughter as she excuses herself from the group of people whom had been chatting while she senselessly stood and 'listened'. She makes it through the throng of people just as the band finishes their cover of Take on Me and feels her heart flutter when blue eyes look down at her with curiosity instead of frustration or anger.  
"You again." It's said with a charming British accent and no malice, simply a statement. Gwen wants to cringe when her immediate reaction is to smile and say, "It's me again." and snort out a small laugh that has him raising his eyebrows in what looks like amusement.  
Her dignity is saved oh-so-graciously by the bands singer asking the crowd for any requests- Gwen's hand shoots up so quickly she fears it may have broken the atmosphere had it gone any higher, and blurts out the first and only Jazz piece she knows. She see's the looks on the cover band's faces; confusion, hesitancy and even annoyance. But there is one face, the only one that matters to her, that looks the slightest bit happy behind a mask of indifference. 

They end up leaving the party together, him with his jacket tossed over his forearm and her with her heels clutched in her hands as they walk uphill to find her car- and his, even though he would never admit to her that he just wanted to walk with her and his car was....parked directly outside of the homeowner/party throwers driveway.  
His name is Arthur, he lives in a single apartment and has a half sister named Morgana whom apparently was the culprit behind a phone call in the middle of their conversation.  
They talk about life, about music and food and passions; his being Jazz, hers being what she insists is acting- he insists otherwise, perhaps what it means to bring life to something artistic, not just something written on paper. She has to smack him upside the head when he says, "anybody can act, haven't you ever heard of adult films?" he's laughing and she's blushing and it feels like they've known each other forever despite it having been mere hours.  
As they make it to her car she shamelessly hopes for a kiss, for a phone number, for him to sheepishly ask for a date.  
He gives her nothing but a polite smile and a, "See Gwen. I told you chivalry wasn't dead." as he closes her car door.  
As she drives away she can't help looking in the rear view mirror as he stands in the road with a smile.

Coincidences come to an end, Gwen realizes, when she doesn't bump into Arthur the next morning on her way to work. Doesn't see him on her first break, nor her second.  
Perhaps, she muses while whipping up an ordered caffè latte, they just weren't meant to be more than acquaintances. She hands the cup to a waiting customer who doesn't tip and continues on taking orders from the minuscule amount of people waiting in a poor excuse of a line- and feels like her heart jumped into her throat when not four minutes after, the Cafe's door opens with the chime of a bell and a familiar person enters with a coffee stained white button up shirt.  
She's overflowing the cup of half made coffee someone had ordered with milk when he realizes he's just entered the Cafe she'd told him about the previous night and gives her the most endearing smile she'd ever seen. Her co-worker looks at her as if she'd gone mad, dropping a cleaning rag on the counter after having had to tap her on the back of the head to get her to stop looking at Arthur like he was the center of her entire universe.  
"How did you find me?" She feels oddly dumb when he raises an eyebrow and leans against the counter as he waits for his ordered coffee- straight black- and she feels like he's trying not to be amused when he mentions her having told him about her place of occupation. "The Cafe by the movie lot, I figured this was the one."  
She can only proceed to make a fool of herself by laughing, stumbling and all around being a shy klutz when he looks at her in that stupidly dreamy way he does.  
The biggest of her klutz moments happens when he asks when her next break is; she manages to knock over the case holding their baked goods.

It stems from a break at work to a night spent on the town, all of his favorite places for music and all of her favorite places for food. They dance with no shame, dare each other to try new cuisines from foreign lands with childish grins and end up stumbling back to his car drunk on love and high on laughter where they share the first of many kisses.  
It's soft and lite and so, so careful. 

Gwen is swept off of her feet and set down in a world she had never known her life was a part of.  
A world where roses are left by her front door on Tuesday's instead of the newspaper, because Arthur remembered her saying she hated reading the things people did to dim the light of the goodness in humanity. Where wakes up with a smile because she can hear the sound of piano keys drifting into his bedroom from the living room. Where she finds notes in her work apron that say I Love You and she knows the feeling of truly meaning the words when she say's she missed him after he comes home from a late gig.

The world is a whole new place with Arthur living in it, from the way her pet peeves are put on the back burner because Arthur is endearing, lovely, and he loves her.  
She's a new person, living in a new world, and she has a whole new meaning with every milestone they hit together; first anniversary, first fight, first time Arthur proposes- and second time when Gwen says yes. The day they're married and Arthur is clapped on the shoulder by his best friend because he can't stop grinning like a simpleton when he looks at her. Their first home as a family, accompanied by a boy with his father's eyes and mother's hair.  
Every first for them is never a last, but they figure life is funny like that; every up has a down, and they experience all of them. 

An actress and a Jazz musician, it makes for an interesting story for how they met and fell in love.  
Gwen never gets tired of it, never feels burdened when their child asks for her to tell it at bedtime nearly every week.  
Instead she smiles and starts with a comical clearing of the throat that earns a small laugh every single time, a smile and that familiar feeling of her head up in the clouds.


End file.
